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A Kitchen for All Occasions
tHERE’S NOTHING WORSE than being halfway into making a birthday cake or big Thanksgiving feast only to realize that you’ve completely run out of vanilla extract or that you underestimated the amount of vital wheat gluten you have in the house. The key to avoiding a mad dash to your nearest grocery store in the middle of preparing your celebration is to keep a well-stocked kitchen that is ready for any occasion. Here are some essentials you should keep handy.
ACTIVE DRY YEAST
Yeast is a plantlike microorganism that serves as a catalyst to the fermentation process. This fermentation process is what makes dough rise and gives breads and dough made with yeast their airy texture. Baking and cooking with yeast requires a warm external temperature. In the summertime I usually keep my home around 78ºF, but even this heat isn’t enough to make yeast happy. The closer you can get to 85ºF the better. There are a couple tricks to keeping your yeast warm enough to rise. The easiest one is to place the bowl with dough inside of it at the highest point in the kitchen, like on top of the refrigerator, where the temperature is warmer. Another great way to get your dough nice and warm is to place it near the oven or stove while you’re cooking another dish. Or you can preheat your oven to 375°F, turn off the heat, then place your bowl inside, leaving the oven door open (do not do this with a plastic bowl). It usually takes yeast about 1 hour to rise in dough. I like to take this time to prepare the other dishes for my celebration feast (which also keeps the kitchen warm), or you can simply find a nice warm place for your dough to rise and take a nap.
AGAVE NECTAR
Agave is most commonly known as the source of tequila. However, when you taste agave nectar, the last thing you’ll think of is tequila (although it does make one great margarita). Agave nectar is a real sugar, as opposed to an artificial or nonnutritive sweetener. It has properties similar to many sugars with one important exception: its glycemic index is significantly lower. It can be found in nearly all conventional grocery stores and health food stores in the same aisle as the sugar and other baking supplies.
CARDAMOM PODS
Cardamom comes in lightweight green or black pods that look pretty boring. But never judge a book by its cover. Those little pods are bursting with flavor, and the best part is you need not grind them, toast them, or roast them to get all that flavor out. Just drop them into recipes like Mulled Pomegranate Cider (page 210) and let the flavors slowly simmer out. The scent of cardamom is unique yet impossible to describe; however, the second the fragrance of cardamom hits your nose you’ll be praising these little pods.
CHIPOTLE PEPPERS IN ADOBO SAUCE
Chipotle peppers are smoked jalapeño peppers and adobo sauce is a rich sauce with tomatoes, garlic, vinegar, salt, and a litany of spices. Put the two together and you have a match made in smokey spice heaven. The heat of chipotle peppers is on par with jalapeños, although I find that the adobo sauce smoothes out the flavor a bit, turning down the heat a couple notches. Chipotle peppers in adobo sauce shine in recipes like Chipotle Black Bean Burgers (page 140), Huevos Rancheros (page 130), Flautas sin Pollo (page 134), and Tempeh Soft Tacos with Lime Crema (page 137).
COCONUT MILK
For the longest time you could typically only find three types of coconut milk: light, sweetened, and unsweetened. No matter what the flavor, every variety came in a can. However, recently So Delicious has come out with a coconut milk beverage that is sold in cartons right alongside soy and rice milk in the refrigerated section of the grocery store. This new coconut milk drink is perfect for pouring over cereal or even baking with instead of soy milk; however, it is much thinner than canned coconut milk and for this reason I never use it for stovetop cooking. Nothing beats the taste of rich, thick, and creamy canned coconut milk. Canned coconut milk is typically found on the ethnic food aisle at conventional and health food grocery stores.
ENER-G EGG REPLACER
Ener-G Egg Replacer is a quick, easy, and simple option for replacing eggs in baked goods; 1½ teaspoons of Ener-G Egg Replacer whisked with 2 tablespoons warm water equals 1 egg. Ener-G Egg Replacer is also one of the most cost-effective ways to replace eggs in a recipe. One box has over 113 servings in it. It took me three and a half years to finish my first box of Ener-G Egg Replacer.
FIVE-SPICE POWDER
My first trip to find five-spice powder took me over twenty minutes in the grocery store. If you’re reading this section, then you will have the distinct advantage of learning from my mistake and making a beeline to the five-spice powder no matter what store you’re in. Five-spice powder is not always in the spice aisle, although this is where you should look first. It is typically hiding on the Asian or ethnic food aisle and might be labeled Chinese Five-Spice Powder.
As the name implies, it is a blend of five aromatic spices that is a perfect mix of sweet, spicy, pungent, sour, and bitter. Although the recipe changes slightly from brand to brand, the typical spice blend will include ground cinnamon, ginger, star anise, cloves, and cassia
